Hot topics

SLUT SHAMING YOUNG GIRLS IN THE NAME OF SEX EDUCATION

Growing up, I did not attain puberty early like some of my peers, but I did experience slut-shaming as part of sex education. I attended a military boarding school, where the closest people to mothers that we had were our teachers, some who were mean and scary. Just like the typical Nigerian mentality, we are taught to not wear fitted skirts or shirts, so we would not attract the boys. For us to meet their preferred standard of dressing, we had to wear big uniforms that mad us look funny. If you were fortunate enough to start getting curves at a young age, your embarrassment would be double, as though they want you to hide your naturally big breasts and curvy hips, or as if having curves is not a natural development for girls. We were practically thought to be ashamed of attaining puberty, because we had to hide our developing bodies, from both our male counterparts and the army officers in the school. If you got caught wearing a school uniform that pronounced your God-given body, you’ll be tagged as a ‘little whore’. And on few occasions when we were given sex education, girls were the ones who were taught on how to avoid or not attract the lads, by wearing extremely big school wears and not wearing lipgloss, or a ‘V neck’ blouse. Of course this is not to say that indecent dressing should be accepted from girls, but to imply that it is absolutely unnecessary to harass girls who are curvy, and asking them to wear big clothes to hide their curves.

This behavior of shaming little girls for growing wasn’t only in my secondary school. I’ve met a few girls who started growing breasts very early, which scared their mothers. One of them told me how her mom would use turning sticks to hit her breast back inside, because she thought it was too early for her daughter to start growing breasts. While some other young females kept hearing embarrassing comments about how they were maturing too fast from their relatives, as if maturity was a bad thing. We even have little girls who had predatory uncles who sexualized them as little as they were, making these girls feel guilty and uncomfortable with their womanly features. And for the ones whose body didn’t grow according to the society’s standard, ‘saggy breasts’ for example, were accused to having sex at early ages, or persecuted for promiscuity, since somehow, saggy breasts is believed to be caused by ‘allowing boys press your breasts’, when we clearly have females whose breasts do not grow firm, while that of others began to sag because of its huge size.

Our society views puberty for young ladies as a thing of shame that should be hidden, because of the fear it of male attraction. People tend to only focus on the sexual aspect of this natural development, ignoring the fact that the aim of this growth is not to attract men. Although it may attract men, but shaming these girls will not in any way stop them from being preyed on by pedophilia men. The whole essence of this beautiful change, which is preparing the girl to grow into a fully grown woman, capable of reproducing is completely ignored, which is not surprising, because men are seen as predators to young ladies. Sex education in this part of the world means blaming and shaming young girls for having beautiful bodies, as it’s a thing of disgust and fear. It often involves teachings of shame, and how ‘letting a boy touch will get you pregnant’, making men look like infectious creatures that should be avoided at all costs, instead of an actual education on sex and how it works, why it should be avoided at early ages, how unprotected sex can lead to unwanted pregnancies, STIs and STDs, and how to avoid all that. The most disturbing part of all these teachings is that it has not in any way reduced teenage pregnancies.
All of these teachings would probably reduced child sexual assault and pregnancies, if boys/men were shamed to. Probably if they were taught to be ashamed of the size of the male organs, and how it can cause females to produce children whom they will be forced to take care of, then we will have boys who are ashamed of their manhood, just like girls are raised to be ashamed of their womanhood.

The best bet to reducing teenage unwanted pregnancies, which is the actual aim of sex education, is by educating teenagers of both genders on the pros and cons of having sex, and how to do it right, and not placing the self worth of ladies on their virginity, or the amount of boys they’ve slept with at a certain age. Young girls should not be taught to to be ashamed of their bodies or of sex, because it is extremely unhealthy for their emotional state, and it also reduces their worth to their virginity. They should not be raised to feel guilty or be ashamed of having or enjoying sex when they are of age either. Neither should they be scared of exploring their bodies through masturbation. Keeping virginity isn’t wrong, but females should not be blackmailed into doing it by all means. It should be a thing of choice. Lies about how early sex or frequent sex can cause a girl’s breast to sag or make her vagina too wide for her husband will only cause females to be objectified and stigmatized for no just reason. All of these need to go. It is also important for the society to begin to hold men responsible for unwanted pregnancies, just like we hold females responsible, the burden and the shame should not be carried by the female alone either.

Thank you for reading. Please drop your comments in the comment section below, don’t forget to like and subscribe to my blog ❤